Oscars. The day after.

By David Hudson on 02/23/2009

[Updated through 2/24]

A sweep, a few mild surprises and at least one too many musical numbers. For an overview of all the Oscar-winners, turn to the Playlist, which does a damn fine job of living up to its name. Here's a first round of first impressions with further updates to follow throughout the day.

"'Slumdog Millionaire' has won one of those extraordinary Oscar-night landslides: a film whose aura of success and feelgood word-of-mouth manages to replicate itself virally inside the heart and mind of every Academy Award voter." Peter Bradshaw in the Guardian: "Oscarology is not an exact science and quite why it has done so spectacularly well is still a bit of a mystery to me, but the time has come for those, like me, who have treated the film with a touch of friendly scepticism to wake up to an important part of what made it so compelling: its differentness, its originality. At a time when consumers of commercial cinema are offered romcoms that look like all the other romcoms, thrillers that look like all the other thrillers, classy period dramas that look like all the other classy period dramas, 'Slumdog Millionaire' really did deliver the shock of the new."

Also: "[Y]et again Britain, novelty and brave adventure do well at the Oscars and the mainstream American product falters," writes David Thomson. "When the 'Slumdog' mob - Europeans and Indians, adults and kids - took the stage to claim the best picture Oscar, a landmark was being established which directly reflects America's reduced place in the world.... What else drew attention? The surprising brevity and modesty of Jerry Lewis's appearance - there was always the prospect that this tyrant genius could hold the show up for ransom."

"'You dwarf even the sky,' ['Slumdog' director Danny] Boyle said in a tribute to the people of Mumbai, who figured by the thousands in his film," report David Carr and Michael Cieply in the New York Times. "Hollywood has been taking on more and more of a global tilt with each passing year, but on this evening it was especially evident in the show and in the awards themselves. After Penélope Cruz won for best supporting actress for her role in 'Vicky Cristina Barcelona,' she gave part of her speech in Spanish - she said backstage it was a dedication to the actors and people of Spain - and then suggested backstage that the movies had to grow beyond the bounds of strictly American stories. 'We are all mixed together, and it has to be reflected in the cinema,' she said."

In the Independent, Guy Adams quotes Sean Penn, accepting his Best Actor award for "Milk": "It's a good time for those who voted for the ban on gay marriage to look into their minds and anticipate their great shame in eyes of their grandchildren. We've got to have equal rights for everyone."

"I'm beginning to believe that saving the Oscars is a job for Iron Man or Hancock, a kick-ass superhero with the kind of unassailable powers that would allow them to radically overhaul what has become the year's stodgiest awardsfest," blogs Patrick Goldstein. Also in the Los Angeles Times, Mary McNamara: "Now I'm sorry, but didn't we decide, like as a nation, that Big Dance numbers were a blight on the Oscars telecast?... At least Kate Winslet finally won her damned Oscar - such a real sense of closure, isn't it?"

And Reed Johnson and Daryl H Miller: "'Departures,' a film of solemn beauty interlaced with gentle humor, won a surprising upset victory for best foreign-language movie over the French entry, 'The Class,' the semi-autobiographical story of a Paris schoolteacher, and 'Waltz With Bashir,' an Israeli animated documentary dealing with the legacy of the 1982 Lebanon war."

Online listening tip. The Guardian's Jason Solomons and Xan Brooks discuss the evening.

Online viewing tips. At Defamer, which is now being folded into Gawker, Ryan Tate presents the "Top Ten Moments Of Gayest Oscars Ever."

Updates: Somini Sengupta in the NYT: "Its depictions of filth and brutality fueled angry blogging and stray street protests. It drew unusually intense scrutiny, from how much its child actors were paid to what the composer AR Rahman would wear to the Oscars. But on Monday, as India woke up to news of the spectacular wins by 'Slumdog Millionaire' at the Academy Awards, this movie-mad country went 'Jai Ho.'"

Scott Foundas is "sure various conspiracy theories will emerge in the next few days as to exactly how and why 'Waltz with Bashir' got screwed.... [I]t seems more likely that Folman's film was simply too innovative for the Academy's notoriously calcified tastes."

"It was a very, very big night for Japan in Hollywood last night," writes Chris MaGee. More from Josef Braun.

"It was the best Oscar show I've ever seen, and I've seen plenty," declares Roger Ebert.

Scott Marks is not happy with the way the Academy treated Jerry Lewis.

"Not the best Oscar show ever (to say the least) but not the worst either." A few "random thoughts" from the Siren.

At GreenCine Daily, Aaron Hillis has "10 Random Questions About the Oscars."

"The most monumental change on this year's show - a keeper - was the brilliant idea of having past winners, five in each acting category, personally address the nominees in a very intimate way," writes Anne Thompson. "It was moving and wonderful to see the nominees talked to directly by people they clearly admired. And you could see the impact of these icons - from Sophia Loren to Robert De Niro - on the folks in the house. They ate it up."

"[T]he show was so overstocked with clips from movies - from this year's nominees and from Oscar winners going back to 1929 - that it was like a TV show with the hiccups," writes the Washington Post's Tom Shales.

"[D]id you notice that in the unaccountably distractingly edited dead-people montage, they made room for Manny Farber?" asks the L Magazine's Mark Asch.

"Why do the Oscars even need a host?" wonders Edward Copeland. "The Globes do without one. Want to save some time? No host."

At Hell on Frisco Bay, Adam Hartzell comments on the "inter-cultural content" of 'Slumdog' - beware, though, there will be spoilers.

Sean Axmaker: "[B]eyond the fact that 2008 was a thin year for American cinema (especially put up against the meaty line-up of nominees last year) and that 'Slumdog Millionaire' is another overrated underdog story with glib social politics only marginally more interesting than those of 'Crash' (Haggis, not Cronenberg), I'd like to say that the Academy did right in its performer awards."

More thoughts: Richard Brody (New Yorker), Bob Cashill and Scott Malchus (Popdose), Jon Chattman (Huffington Post), Mike D'Angelo, Matt Dentler, Erich Kuersten (Bright Lights After Dark), AJ Schnack, Dana Stevens, Troy Patterson and Seth Stevenson (Slate) and Bob Turnbull.

Online browsing tip. "What a Night It Was," Vanity Fair's pix from the evening.

Online listening tip. Jerry Lentz's take.

Online viewing tip. Guardian critics comment on the British sweep and the show in general.

Online viewing tips. FirstShowing posts that "Upcoming Movies" montage and the Judd Apatow short featuring James Franco and Seth Rogen.

"[O]ne thing that's become clear is that the film industry feels no confidence about the cultural significance of its own products," argues Andrew O'Hehir in Salon. "Oscar's angst and confusion produced a much more enjoyable telecast this year, and God knows we all needed that." But: "Can you continue to build an evening of candyfloss entertainment and Hugh Jackman goodfooting, year after year, out of the spectacle of the mainstream film industry writhing in Hamlet-like uncertainty on the spit of its own despair?"

David Poland enjoyed the show for what it was. What's more, "what worked so very beautifully about the idea was that it really did honor the idea of the performers and what they brought to the table and the community that The Academy is meant to represent at its best."

At the SpoutBlog, Christopher Campbell rounds up the "Best of the LiveBloggery." And more.

Hendrik Hertzberg had a good time: "So sue me."

Updates, 2/24: "So far, most of the awards collected by ['Slumdog'] have been accepted in the name of 'the children,'" writes Mitu Sengupta at Alternet, "suggesting that its own cast and crew regard it (and have relentlessly promoted it) not as a cinematically spectacular, musically rich and entertaining work of fiction, which it is, but as a powerful tool of advocacy. Nothing could be more worrying, as 'Slumdog,' despite all the hype to the contrary, delivers a deeply disempowering narrative about the poor that thoroughly undermines, if not totally negates, its seeming message of social justice."

More on the telecast from Stuart Jeffries (Guardian) and Alessandra Stanley (NYT).

"By the time they get to the red carpet, the new meta-nominees have been positioned, polished, and poised to become yet another name in what is increasingly becoming a meaningless Hall of Fame," writes Bill Gibron at PopMatters.

Online viewing tip. Uwe Boll thanks the Razzies for his Lifetime Achievement Award.

[Photos: "Slumdog Millionaire," Fox Searchlight, 2008; "Departures," Regent Releasing, 2008]

Tags: Danny Boyle, Kate Winslet, Milk, Oscars, Sean Penn, Slumdog Millionaire